A spoonful of sugar...

I’ve finally re-emerged after what has been one of the worst Autumns I can ever remember. Never before have I been so angry with an England performance that I’ve wanted to rip out my eye-balls and replace them with the testicles from a leprous baboon. But there were moments over the last 3 weeks when I was seriously tempted.

“Oh but we did so much better against New Zealand, we showed real spirit”

Fuck off. We lost. And we lost comfortably to a shit New Zealand team with Dan Carter kicking like my dead gran. But more on my England theories later.

In order to cheer everyone up I thought it would be a great time for round two of the Eyes Right, Bollocks Tight Cheerleader of the Month competition. Woo hoo!

Nominations have been pouring in from all corners of the globe but our expert panel of judges – Mother Palm and her 5 sisters – have whittled the list down to this month’s winner.

Congratulations go to [dramatic drum-roll please]……

Melandi of the Vodacom Cheetahs. Yay.

According to her website profile of this “flip-flopping dancing beauty loves doing things she usually wouldn’t do, because she loves surprising herself”. Ding Dong.

The athlete she admires the most is Lance Armstrong and her hidden talent is that she is flexible – see pic right. She enjoys pornography – oh no, wait, sorry – photography as a hobby and “feels inspired by music, emotion and being an individual”. Bleaughhhh!!!

Commenting on the win Melandi said: “Wow – what an honour. This is just the best. We’ve all been feeling pretty low since the Bokka lost AGAIN last week and this has cheered me up so much. Thanks Mother Rucker – feel free to visit the Cheetah girls anytime you’re in Free State. We’d love to see you.”

You know what, maybe I will.

Prediction Time

Time to get my predictions hat on ahead of this weekend’s international action.

England Vs Australia

I’ll be honest, I’m worried. My heart is saying “We can do it. We’re fielding a team of substitutes but it’ll be fine - they’ll step up. The boys will play the game of their lives and bring more passion to Twickenham than Berlusconi on twelve Viagra at the Playboy bloody mansion.” But my head is telling my heart “Fuck right off mate, we’ve got more chance of finding Abu Hamza reading the bible in a glove shop”.

I’m afraid, dear friends, that England will have their arses handed to them.

Australia will win by 15.

Wales Vs New Zealand

Let’s pray there is another post haka front up. Wales will be all out gunning for the ABs this year and I reckon there is a chance they could do it. But they won’t.

New Zealand will win by 3.

You can't knock passion

While I might not whole-heartedly agree with Martin Johnson's decision to include Steve Thompson in England's starting line up, it does force me to doff my cap to the Brive man.

Having been told he should never play rugby again because of a serious neck injury, Thompson could have taken his coaching job and his £500,000 insurance payment and left it at that. But no. He still had the hunger to play. He sourced a second opinion, was told he could safely take to the field, and decided to give it a go.

Of course, this left the small matter of his insurance payment. If he was to play again he'd need to give back the loot, otherwise he could expect a huge law suit and very probably some giant of a Gaul banging down his door and stealing his kids. Most people, myself included, would probably have thought "Fuck it. I've won the world cup, a grandslam, and 3 caps for the Lions. This is more hassle that it's worth".

But did the big man think that? No. He paid back the loan and got back on the saddle.

And what better vindication of a decision than to get the call up to your national side. He might be in because of injuries to many of the other options but to hell with it. The man deserves a great deal of praise for staging a remarkable come back and for proving to some of the doubters out there that the professional game still contains men willing to make huge sacrifices to play the sport they love.

The more Steve Thompsons we have in the game the better.

Count down to Twickenham

Not exactly flush with possibilities, are we? With Tindall and Blaze now on the England bonfire the tally of unavailable players comes to 76 props, 13 locks, 24.5 back row and 37 backs.

It’s a miracle yours truly hasn’t been called up yet.

But I suppose every cloud has a silver lining. The one “good” thing to come out of the injury pile up is the righting of the madness that saw Nick Kennedy being left out of the squad completely. Thankfully he’s back in the mix and to my mind should be one of the first names on Jonno’s team sheet.

The key concern is obviously up front. The Aussies aren’t the scrummaging joke they once were, the Pumas are probably the most feared pack in world rugby and the All Blacks are, well, despite not having a functioning line-out, the All Blacks.

England will have to front up big time if we’re to match any of the tourists at the set piece. And as much as it pains me to say it, it looks likely we’ll have an all Leicester back row. Steffon Armitage is a great player, but Lewis Moody is a lunatic and we’ll need his combination of lunacy and experience at the back of the scrums and at the breakdown.

For me the backs pick themselves. The only toss up is between Foden and Cueto at fullback. Foden can be dodgy under the highball but has the magic England need at the moment while Cueto is tried, tested, solid and in form.

One thing is certain, England are going to be hard pressed to win these autumn games but there is reason to be cheerful. The Messiah is back and there are a few players in the mix who may yet do enough of the business to give the nation a collective hard on. Here is my line up for the 7th (assuming I have to put Borthwick in as captain):

1. Tim Payne
2. Dylan Hartley
3. Duncan Bell
4. Steve Borthwick ©
5. Nick Kennedy
6. Tom Croft
7. Lewis Moody
8. Jordan Crane
9. Paul Hodgson
10. Jonny Wilkinson
11. Matt Banahan
12. Shane Geraghty
13. Dan Hipkiss
14. Ugo Monye
15. Ben Foden

16. David Barnes
17. David Wilson
18. Courtney Lawes
19. Louis Deacon
20. Mathew Tait
21. Danny Care
22. Mark Cueto